Speaking of video, has anyone run across the reason for the 4gb video limit? 12 minutes is probably enough to get the highlights of a wedding ceremony or dance recital routine, but it seems like an awfully arbitrary value. Is there some problem on the backend, such as editing software having a limit on how large a file is practical to handle? I initially wasn't that interested in video, but since they put what appears to be a pretty good implementation in I am starting to get intrigued. For $340 B&H has a shotgun mic, hotshoe stand, and cable - I expect that would be a pretty good improvement over a standard camcorder's built-in.
As long as we're talking video, what's a reasonably priced/featured editing package? Does CS4 have something in it's suite?
If the per pixel resolution is as good as my 40D, then my 100-400 maximum reach will have gained 200 mm. If they are claiming 2 stops of generally improved noise performance, then how much better noise performance would the 7D's sraw be than my 40D's equally sized raw? I hope this lives up to its specs.
I have not been too tempted to trade up my 5D 1 for the mk 2 since its 12.8 MP and noise levels have not needed improvement for my use. At the wide end of things you crop with zoom and time is on your side. A crop camera with long telephoto is another story - more pixels is more reach and better SNR means more shutter speed. Better AF and movie clips too! Waiting for the reviews.
timbop wrote:
As long as we're talking video, what's a reasonably priced/featured editing package? Does CS4 have something in it's suite?
Of course Adobe has tried to position themselves to be ready for a whole new community of HD shooters. They have a Master Suite of programs geared towards this. Check out their website for more details on their programs. I'm barely getting into them myself, and don't have a clue as to how they stack up to Final Cut Pro.
OK, so assuming I record in "vga" resolution, if I convert that to an mpeg-2 standard def DVD will the aspect ratio be correct? Anyone have any idea if the results would be reasonably good?
n0b0 wrote:
Car market isn't an olygopoly and PC is modular because there's no one company that develop and manufacture every single components in the PC. Intel doesn't make hard drive, nVidia doesn't make RAM, etc.
Cars (and computers) have pretty much become commodity items. Cars because they all use a fairly standard infrastructure (roads, fuel), and economy of scale. Computers are going that way, as the Mac can now run Windows and both can run some version of Unix. The commonality of the Internet has helped standardize some aspects of computers IMHO.
Cameras, OTOH, are still fairly proprietary and marketing to a price point tends to push a large portion of the feature set outside of the market for professional gear. One exception has been in memory devices which has commonized to a few standard choices.
Printers are now sold below cost as the profits come from sales of ink and paper.
While the 50D didn't seem to me like a worthy upgrade to my 40D, the 7D does. And while Canon hasn't addressed any of the shortcomings I found in my 40D, it's hard to resist. I've became a gearhead.
Jeff Nolten wrote:
If the per pixel resolution is as good as my 40D, then my 100-400 maximum reach will have gained 200 mm. If they are claiming 2 stops of generally improved noise performance, then how much better noise performance would the 7D's sraw be than my 40D's equally sized raw? I hope this lives up to its specs.
I have not been too tempted to trade up my 5D 1 for the mk 2 since its 12.8 MP and noise levels have not needed improvement for my use. At the wide end of things you crop with zoom and time is on your side. A crop camera with long telephoto is another story - more pixels is more reach and better SNR means more shutter speed. Better AF and movie clips too! Waiting for the reviews....Show more →
We must think alike.
I was planning on upgrading to the 5DmkII, but I was underwhelmed with what Canon did with it. I'm not really a high ISO shooter. Keeping my old 5D and upgrading the 40D with the 7D might be the way to go, at least until the 3D is announced.
Jeff Nolten wrote:
If they are claiming 2 stops of generally improved noise performance
That would be "ambitious", I think.
But the 40D is pretty damn' good at high ISOs converted in say, Capture One 4.
I shoot 1600 and 3200 ISO happily enough with my 40D because Cap One 4 is excellent with high ISO 40D files - I easily get more than a stop extra out of my files by converting in Cap One 4 rather than in ACR or Lr - and I think that if we see about 0.75 to 1 stop more from the 7D at high ISO (it'd surprise me if we get a stop, but you never know) we'll be in a very good place, not least because it looks - so far - like high ISO pattern noise ("banding") is sorted.
then how much better noise performance would the 7D's sraw be than my 40D's equally sized raw?
The M-RAW setting gives 10mp files with identical linear dimensions to 40D RAW files, Jeff - that should be interesting!
ExxWhy wrote:
There you have it, Canon made a choice based on what they think would be a better selling point. They looked at the relatively tiny percentage of users who ever change focussing screens vs the number of people who would think the new "gizmo" screen is a plus and decided it favored the new screen.
Here I am thinking the new gizmo screen did not go far enough.... Why not allow user custom grid lines....looks like it's just the grid or various focus points. It would be REAL handy for me to have the gizmo project 4:5 crop marks on the sides. Some that never have to fit into ancient 8x10 frames would think that's stupid. Others might like "rule" of thirds or golden mean or whatever projected - I mean why not?
We all have to have some gripes right.... So that is mine - not enough wizzbang on the new "gizmo" :-)... while they went further then before for customization (a good direction to add rel features insted of this stupid MP race - although they did that as well unfortunately on this one), it's still limited for no real reason due to the interface not hardware - you cannot tell me that gizmo could not project whatever it wanted from the hardware point - at least far more then is currently shown. We all know how Canon rarely updates firmware for new features to save up for "upgrades" :-(
But then - I only use manual focus when the stupid AF system cannot deal with what looks obvious from my eyes.... looks like they took a step in reducing MF for me - although an AF assist might be a nice addition (and no I don't want the disco strobing from the popup.
p.s. - I like that technical term for the new thingi... Gizmo
I was planning on upgrading to the 5DmkII, but I was underwhelmed with what Canon did with it. I'm not really a high ISO shooter. Keeping my old 5D and upgrading the 40D with the 7D might be the way to go, at least until the 3D is announced.
+1 here.
I have the same pair and while the 40D is nice, the 7D would not just be an in-family upgrade, it might delay my yearning for a 1D series for a while.
I don't care about interchangeable screens on a 1.6x cropper, as I don't use super fast glass on them. I leave that to my 5D/1D II, but given the VF of the 7D is as large as the 1D III, it is now actually not a bad choice for fast glass, so a screen optimised for that would be nice for some people, and as Paul argues, why offer the screens on the earlier models with their smaller darker VF's?
I would be eager to see how the Sigma 50 f/1.4 goes on the 7D, since you can use the spot AF option for far more accurate focus, which is ideal for shooting wide or near open.
